


Wyrms in the Black

by FireOpal (Raven_At_The_Writing_Desk)



Series: Random Cayrd and Frias [9]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Original Work
Genre: Gen, M/M, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-03-07
Packaged: 2019-11-13 07:41:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18027575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raven_At_The_Writing_Desk/pseuds/FireOpal
Summary: Cayrd takes a job that takes his crew into unstable mining tunnels. What lurks down there, and what do they have to fear in the dark?





	Wyrms in the Black

**Author's Note:**

> Kudo's are great, but I'd really love to hear from you. Please leave a comment and tell me what you liked., or didn't. Just be nice.

Cayrd looked over the job description the rather well-dressed creature before he handed him. He arched an eyebrow a the price-tag attached to the job, that was an unusually high amount for something as simple as a recovery mission.

  
“I have a guide waiting for your team when you get to J8-Hiver.” The glittering humanoid said. They took a moment to check the golden filigree coating on their nails, then sighed. “I’ll pay you the full amount when I get the data from the droid.”

  
“So ya got a droid that’s lost in yer new tunnel system on the mining asteroid, and yer workers wont go in till ya recover the data from the droid because it was testing the stability of the areas.” Cayrd tapped the data pad on the table before taking a sip of the golden colored liquid in his glass. The humanoid sniffed and waved a bejeweled hand.

  
“Unfortunately, and each standard day they aren’t working is credits lost. I’d like this cleared up ass soon as possible. The ores on the asteroid are simply too valuable to walk away from.” The humanoid shrugged. “Do you think your team can handle it?”

  
Cayrd had an uneasy feeling about the whole thing, but the price was nice, and he had faith in his team. If they were prepared, things wouldn’t be so bad.

  
“Alright,” Cayrd flipped the data pad and tapped the send button. His own wrist com unit beeped signaling it received the data. “We’ll be there in one standard day.”

  
“Not sooner?” The humanoid sniffed. Cayrd arched his eyebrow with an unfriendly smirk. The humanoid shifted, the metals and gems on their exposed ruby colored skin glinting like a disco-ball. “I suppose that will do.”

  
“Good,” Cayrd stood up, and polished off his drink in one go. “Nice doing business with ya.” He gave the humanoid a little bow, then left. He needed to pull his team together and get them prepped.

***

The old man that greeted them looked like an average humanoid that had spent too much time underground. He was grizzly looking, his gray skin permanently stained with the green dirt of the planet. He greeted Cayrd and his team as they disembarked from Cayrd’s ship, the Fire Opal.

  
“The owner told me ya’d be showing up.” The man scratched his unruly lavender beard. “Ah wus told ta give ya whatever ya needed.”

  
“Much appreciated,” Cayrd said as his team fanned out behind him. Frias, rosy skin and pink hair, looking like a cherub dressed in assassin black. Pelivor, their floppy bunny ears and creamy fur hiding the poison spines, wicked claws, and sharp incisors their species used as natural weapons. Lastly Elius, the purple shelled insectoid with humanoid features, who currently looked nervous and out of place.

  
“Mah team.” Cayrd pointed with a thumb back at them. The man looked unimpressed.

  
“Y’all eve been in tunnels before?” He asked. “Ain’t the place fer amateurs.”

  
“We’ll be fine,” Cayrd said a little irritably. It’d been a long while since he was in a mining tunnel, but it wasn’t something he was going to forget. “What do ya have fer us before we go down there?” The old man spit a stream of thick black fluid on the ground and scratched his beard.

  
“Usual mine,” the guy said. “Two branches, east, and west. West is the main shaft, east is still being settled. Droid went west. We got thayrium, smuisium, pleorium, and iobline down there, among other minerals, and wyrms.”   
“Worms?” Elius asked looking skeptical. The old man nodded and spat again.

  
“Black ones. Ah ain't never seen one mahself, but Ah ain't going back in there till ya find the droid,” the man said looking at Cayrd.

  
“Ya never saw them? How do ya know their there?” Cayrd understood the old miner.

  
“Lost a couple workers a few years back. We set up a repellent field, but it ain't been on since the mine closed.” The old miner shrugged. “Owner said ya would be prepared, but Ah figured ya should be warned.”

  
Cayrd nodded, and the old man nodded, and everyone looked at Cayrd confused.

  
“If ya need me Ah’ll be over at the Foreman’s shack.” He pointed over at the yellow octagon building not far from the mine entrance.

  
“Much appreciated.” Cayrd exchanged nods with the old man again and then the old miner walked over to the shack, leaving Cayrd and his crew to contemplate the mine.

  
“Alright, Pelivor, and Frias, head down the west tunnel, find the operations hub, and monitor things from there. Elius and Ah are heading down the east tunnel to go find the missing droid.” Cayrd pointed out the two tunnels to his people and they nodded. Frias frowned but didn’t say anything, Cayrd knew Frias wanted to be with him, but this was one time, Frias wouldn’t be very helpful. Cayrd checked his blaster and gear. “Elius’ got the dark vision like me, we’ll be fine down there.”

  
“Won’t it be dark in the west tunnel too?” Frias was looking down the considerably dim hole in the olive-green earth.

  
“West tunnel is the most developed, It houses the operations center and will have artificial lights going throughout. If you have to go too far into the dark, just come back. Ah don’t want ya getting lost down there.”

  
“We have suits and LEDs,” Pelivor pointed out. Cayrd gave them a little smirk

  
“J8-Hiver’s soil has several different minerals that collect in denser nodes the further into the ground you go. Those four he rambled off will disrupt various forms of technology. Like coms, climate suits, LED’s and blasters.”

He clicked a clip into a ballistic gun with a wink. “And there’s large wyrms down here that bounce blaster fire, so ballistic rounds are about all that’ll get through their scales.”

  
Everyone looked a little nervous about that. Blasters were the preferred weapon in space, most hand-held blasters couldn’t cut through the hull of a ship. Ballistic guns were a little more chancey. Cayrd watched Frias double checked his rifle and his belt, the man was always prepared for anything. He still looked less than pleased though. Frias came from a tropical area on his home plant, well lit with warm sun. He wasn’t built for the dark like Cayrd was.

  
“Just stay out of the dark and you’ll be fine,” Cayrd said. Pelivor sniffed and led the way down the tunnel, Frias falling in behind.

  
Frias sent Cayrd one last look, and Cayrd winked at him with a little kiss. Frias blushed slightly, and couldn’t help a soft smile. Cayrd grinned, hoping the light flirtation put him at ease. He’d make it up to Frias later back in their cabin.

  
“Shouldn’t I go with them?” Elius piped up as Cayrd began going down the east tunnel. “They might need me, to see for them?” The little purple shelled creature sounded like they’d rather be with the others. Cayrd shook his head.

  
“Ah need an egg-head with me,” Cayrd reached back and grabbed the lapel of Elius’ jacket, yanking them down the tunnel with him. “And you can see in the dark. We’re going pretty far down.”

  
“Not to be a buzzkill, but I can only see in the dark to a point.” Elius scrambled alongside Cayrd, looking nervously around.

  
“We’ll have some light down here, it hasn’t been mined as much at the west tunnel and still has luminescent veins in it. We’ll have enough light.” Cayrd ran his hand absently over the little bump in his pants pocket. He’d brought eye-drops that would dissolve the protective film he had on his eyes. It would let him see in near total darkness if he removed it, however, it would make any amount of unfiltered light sheer agony. He didn’t expect to need them, but better safe than sorry. If they had to go deeper than his filmed eyes could see, he’d be able to guide Elius. He’d deal with getting his eyes re-filmed when they got home.

  
“So, how are we going to find this thing?” Elius asked, already noticing their wrist unit’s screen was acting up. Cayrd chuckled and showed him a map printed on paper. “You’re joking.”

  
“You’re not the mining type are ya?” Cayrd said following the tunnels. Elius shook their head, short orange dreadlocks bounced around their pointed ears.

  
“Not really, I was always more of a sit-in-front of a screen kinda person,” Elius said.

  
“Must have been hard on a planet that hadn’t invented artificial light yet,” Cayrd teased.

  
“Well, now you know why I left.” Elius laughed. Cayrd chuckled, Elius was an unusual one, from a backwater planet, he’d managed to run away from and ended up on the Hubris. Cayrd noticed the little purple bug and their penchant for technology. He’d snatched the little critter up and added them to his crew. Kid was still a little green behind the ears, but they were cocky and talented, and Cayrd appreciated that.

They followed the map deeper into the tunnels, the light from outside faded to the artificial lights hung throughout the shored up tunnels. Eventually, even those gave out, as did the signals on their coms units. The two were reliant on their own dark sight. Elius pushed up their goggles with a sigh, their eyes glowing faintly in the dark.

  
“I don’t mind the goggles most of the time, but it’s nice to walk around without them, you know?” Elius rubbed the sharp ridge of their nose.

  
“Ah got mah eyes filmed,” Cayrd said. “Didn’t want ta risk being blinded in a fight.” Elius nodded.

  
“Make’s sense, makes sense.” Elius looked up at Cayrd curiously. “Did it, uh, hurt?”

  
“The film?” Cayrd chuckled, “Naw. Made mah eyes watered fer a day or so, but it never hurt.” He looked sideways at Elius. “But Ahm a lot tougher than ya.”

  
Elius gave him a dirty look and huffed. “I’m pretty tough,” they tapped on their chest and Cayrd heard the thunk of their exoskeleton.

  
“Yer a cream-puff under that and we both know it.” Cayrd grinned and Elius made a low growl and bared this own sharp teeth, trying to look fierce.

  
“Awe now, keep it down, too much noise and the walls might become unstable.” Cayrd almost laughed again when the fierce look was instantly replaced with one of caution. Elius looked around as if the walls might fall in at any minute. The growl kept echoing though, and Cayrd shook his head. “Seriously, knock it off.”

  
“That’s not me,” Elius whispered.

  
“Fuck me,” Cayrd put a hand on Elius’ shoulder. “Stay very close, and if the ground shifts, jump fast.”

  
“Wh-why?” Elius whispered now looking at their feet, picking one up at a time.

  
“Wyrms,” Cayrd’s hand drifted to his gun.

  
“L-like the guy out front said?” Elius relaxed a little. “The black worms?” Elius made a wiggly motion with their finger. “So?”

  
The massive horned head of sleek black creature shattered the wall beside them. Cayrd shoved Elius back up the tunnel the way they’d come.

  
“So that!” Cayrd aimed down the tunnel and fired. The first shot went wide and the creature turned into the tunnel fully, sliding towards them. It lowered it’s shovel-shaped head and growled again.

  
“Oh shit! Oh shit!” Elius scrambled back behind Cayrd but the creature took up so much space in the tunnel, there was no way around it. Cayrd took a stand in the middle and sighted down the creature, three quick shots, the first hitting it between the eyes and cracking the creatures thick armor the second two going straight into its brain.

  
The wyrm’s growl became a high pitched shriek as it’s dying momentum propelled it forward. It hit the ground hard and slid towards, then over, Cayrd.

  
“Commander!” Elius screamed.

  
Cayrd felt all the air in his lungs being pushed out of him. The damn wyrm’s head was crushing the life out of him.

  
“Shit, Commander!” Two spiky hands reached under the chin of the wyrm, right beside his head. “Hang on, shit, don’t be dead, don’t be dead,” Elius grunted as they tried to lift the massive head of the wyrm. “Fuck this is heavy!”

  
Cayrd saw the tiny sliver of murky light and clawed his way to it, pushing against the throat of the wyrm to get out from underneath it. Elius made another grunt and it sounded desperate so Cayrd scrambled faster to get out from under the beast before Elius’ strength gave out.

  
He rolled clear as Elius grip slipped. The wyrm’s head thumped back down on the ground and Cayrd waved a hand around to clear his air of dust.

  
“Commander? Say something?” Elius’s purple face hovered over his in the dim light.

  
“Ahm fine,” Cayrd coughed. “Just need, ta catch mah breath.” Elius crouched down beside him looking like he’d relaxed some.

  
“So th-that’s a worm?” Elius asked looking over at the thing. “I expected, you know, like something small.” They held their fingers up a few inches apart.

  
“Wyrm,” Cayrd groaned. “ W-Y-R-M. Giant snake, moron.”

  
“Huh…” Elius looked back at the thing. “You know, this is the problem with language. Too many words that sound the same,”

  
“Sure, blame it on yer translator.” Cayrd sat up and shook his head. “Alright, enough of a break.” He pulled himself to his feet using the wyrm’s plated jaw. “Heavy bastards,” Cayrd said feeling a twinge in his hip. He’d pulled something. He sucked-up his dignity and managed not to limp.

  
“Are you sure Commander?” Elius asked. “I mean, we can wait more if you want?”

  
“Ahm fine. Let’s get going, we’re gonna have ta squeeze past this bulky bastard.” Cayrd pointed at the small gap between the wyrm’s bulk and the tunnel wall. “Quit stalling and start crawling.” He led the way into the gap and assumed Elius would follow.


End file.
